Spirited Again
by Preacher
Summary: A set of similar circumstances and a very peculiar train ride...could Chihiro be going back to the Spirit World? Chapter 1, more coming with reviews.


Spirited Again  
  
A Spirited Away Fanfiction by Preacher  
  
I saw Spirited Away largely due to its success in the Academy Awards, and on the recommendation of a friend I bought it. It is one of the most beautifully done and heartwarming films I have ever seen, and I applaud Hiyao Miyazaki and the rest of the Studio Ghibli staff who worked on it. At the end of the movie, however, there are questions left hanging in the air- questions which this fanfiction will give one perspective on. Will Chihiro ever be able to return to the spirit world? Will she meet with Haku again? Haku had promised that they would see each other at the end of Spirited Away, but how? Perhaps, with the time I put into this, you might be left with an idea of your own. Regretfully, a fanfiction cannot do justice to a 2 hour film in it's own right, but I shall try to create as vivid a world Miyazaki created in his.  
  
DISCLAIMER: I have no part in the ownership, creation of, or legal rights to any of the characters features in the Spirited Away film. Those characters, places, and ideas belong to their respective owners, most likely under the wing of Hiyao Miyazaki, Studio Ghibli, and what property Disney has to those rights. This work is merely an extension of the first movie from the eyes of a fan, and should be considered nothing more than a tribute to an excellent film in it's own right.  
  
I do, however, claim the rights of characters of my own creation. I shall denote such claims at the end of the chapters in which the respective characters appear.  
  
Name spellings are taken from the Online Ghibli site. Online Ghibli is a fansite that can be reached at onlineghibli.com.  
  
Thank you, and I hope that you enjoy the fiction. Questions, comments, or praise? Leave a review!  
  
~Chapter 1: Spirited Again~  
  
Thanks for coming to visit, Chihiro! Missing you already. Hope to see you soon! ^_^ Your friend, Risa.  
  
Chihiro read the goodbye note from Risa once again. Once again, she was leaving her, and once again she had a goodbye card. She had just spent a week visiting her old friend, and again she had received a note and a bouquet as a goodbye gift. Chihiro smiled. The last time this had happened seemed so long ago.the irony didn't escape her. The last time she had seen a bouquet was under the same circumstances- saying goodbye, leaving her friend, and moving onward, but that had led to much stranger things.  
  
It had been a mere four months or so since she had returned from her adventures in the spirit world. Chihiro smiled and gazed out the window of the train. It had been four months of school where she would stare out the windows and daydream of the places she had seen. She though constantly about everyone- especially Haku. It all seemed impossibly far away from the world of day-in, day-out life she was living again. Her teachers saw her as being inattentive, and many a day she had been called back from a dreamy reverie by the sharp slap of a ruler on her desk. It was as if she had been filled with a new sort of apathy, as again she was away from the friends she knew.  
  
She missed the time she had spent in the spirit world terribly. It had only taken days, but she had become so attached to it- she was feeling homesick, even though she was at home. She missed everyone- Haku, Rin, Kamajii, Zeniiba.even Yu-baaba's stern and often grumpy manner. And Kaonashi, and the susuwatari.her social life at her new school wasn't exactly dead, but she only had a small group of friends, and she felt she couldn't really talk to them about her adventures.  
  
Risa was different. Chihiro had known her for so long that within a couple of hours of her arrival, Chihiro had already told Risa the entire story of her trip. The best part was that Risa believed her. Other people she had told had shunned her story. Her parents dismissed it as something she had dreamed up while she wandered off, even despite the inexplicable fact that they had been gone for two weeks! That had caused a major holdup with moving in, that was certain. Chihiro dared not tell it to anyone at school, or she would be seen as crazy and a fool. But there were two people who believed her- Risa, and Chihiro's grandmother. Her grandmother took it with a sort of quiet acceptance, for in her childhood perhaps the world had not forgotten all of the spirits.  
  
She was brought back to reality by the train's rocking sharply as it took a turn. The train she was on was a connection back to her now not-so- new home, and it would take all night to get there. Her flowers would be in bad shape by the end of the journey, just as they were the first time.they were the same kind as before, roses. Chihiro let herself nod, as the sun was setting in a glorious show of fire in the west. The warm glow of the sun, the gentle rocking of the train, and the smell of roses took her away, and Chihiro let herself be lulled into sleep.  
  
"Chihiro."  
  
The dream always started this way. She could hear Haku's voice. Once again she was standing back on the steps of the brook before the fields that led back to her parents, and her world.  
  
"Promise?"  
  
"Promise."  
  
And then she was running back, down the narrow, rocky paths that led back to her parents. And suddenly, she was standing on the bridge of the bathhouse. It made no sense in how she suddenly appeared from place to place, but in dreams, things like this are all too commonplace. She stared at the sky, and expected to see Haku there, flying away. And then she was on the balcony of her sleeping quarters, watching Haku fight off the paper birds, and she yelled at him to come to safety but he fell into the water and was gone. She was falling with him, then, and they were back in the tall tunnel that the trap door led to. She shouted at him to wake up, but he fell closer and closer to the inky blackness of the myriad of spirits who rose up to grab them and-  
  
Chihiro awoke with a start and was greeted by the rushing of a verdant sea past the glass. She rubbed the dream away from her eyes. It always ended with uncertainty. In real life, Haku had come to consciousness and saved both of them (all four, really, with the Yu Bird and Bou), but in the dream she never saw him turn back up. She turned here eyes back to the green waves of leaves that flew by outside. Funny, she didn't remember coming through a forest on the way there.she gazed ahead, in the direction the train was traveling. Nothing but woods as far as she could see. Then, a most peculiar thing happened- a small, squat statue with pudgy eyes and a wide, fat grin nearly covered by moss stood smiling as the train rushed past.  
  
"Hey, that's-" Chihiro blinked at the statue. The backside of the statue was the same way- that smugly smiling face. Could it have been? That statue was too rare and too familiar to mean anything else. Then the train rushed into a tunnel, and all was blackness. Chihiro was the only person in her traincar, it had been a very late train to take back from Ruki's town. She was left alone in the silence and darkness with all sorts of wild thoughts running through her head. Could it really be the same train? The same statue? Another way into the spirit world? Her pulse quickened with the possibilities. What if she could really go back? What if, what if, what if?  
  
The train exited the tunnel and the world turned into an endlessly swaying pasture of gold. Fields of grain spread out as far as the eye could see, and here and there old, run down farmhouses dotted the countryside. It was most certainly not the way she had come on this train before. The train didn't look any different; it was still the same empty passenger car. It was like the one she had taken to Swamp Bottom with Kaonashi, but then again all the trains were like that one. The train entered another tunnel, and the darkness led downward and downward on an endless slope. Chihiro blinked in the dark of the traincar.  
  
Could she really be going back?  
  
~End of Chapter 1~  
  
I'd beg shamelessly for reviews, but if you're this far already then you probably are at the least a bit intrigued by what's happening. I figure it like this- if you have a problem or you love it, you'll leave a review. If you dislike the story, you're probably not reading this anymore! So, since you're reading this, I can assume you're in that first group! You want more, you tell me!  
  
Chapter two coming after 1 positive review. 


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